Letter to the editor: God's motive and his 'plan for the ages'

Tuesday, August 5, 2014 - 12:01 am

A gentleman recently shared his thoughts in a letter to the editor concerning the fallacy of a belief in God. He attributed such “delusional” thinking to reliance on “faith” rather than science. Someone responded to his letter exposing the intellectual dishonesty and “blind faith” in speculative science reflected in the gentleman’s arguments.

The first gentleman submitted a second letter. Unable to counter the facts presented in support of the true God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, he decided to attack the God he believes exists only in the minds of the foolish.

As usual with those who have a bias against a god other than themselves, a couple of Bible verses were cherry-picked to create a perverted context in support of a faulty argument. The intent seemed to be a sarcastic view of the motives and personality of the Christian God.

I want to share a factual account of God’s motive and “plan for the ages.” Before time was, God was. He had a plan and knew in advance how everything was going to work out. He would create the earth, the heavens and all living things, including two kinds of “beings.”

He first created spiritual beings called “angels.” Certain of these, encouraged by the most powerful angel (Lucifer), rebelled against God and were cast out of His presence. He then created a new kind of being — Adam, the first “human” being.

Why humans? Because God wanted a free-thinking physical being who, by exercise of free will, could choose to love him or reject him. Since then, Lucifer, already having rejected God, has been doing everything in his power to influence humans to share in his rejection of the creator.

Initially God had only one guideline for newly created man and woman — not to eat from one particular tree. Everything else was their domain and freedom. But man, influenced by Lucifer, could not even abide by one command. As a result, God introduced the concept of choices and consequences. Freedom demands accountability. Man has been feeling the effects of poor choices ever since, blaming God rather than themselves for the painful outcomes.

Because God is holy, righteous and just, all evil and sin must be absent from his presence and ultimately judged and punished. Being compassionate and gracious, God, in human form as Jesus Christ, offered himself as a sacrifice to cover the bad choices and actions of human beings. It’s all about relationship, not religion and ritual! All God asks is that we accept his free gift.